Matt_Simpson comments on The Academic Epistemology Cross Section: Who Cares More About Status? - Less Wrong

12 Post author: Matt_Simpson 15 November 2009 07:37PM

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Comment author: taw 15 November 2009 11:20:30PM 6 points [-]

I’ve argued that the main social function of academia is to let students, patrons, readers, etc. affiliate with credentialed-as-impressive minds.

What does this theory predict relative to theory that people are interested in quality teaching and research, and they use reputation as a not terribly reliable proxy for it, as quality is too hard to measure for most people?

Comment author: Matt_Simpson 16 November 2009 02:34:04AM *  1 point [-]

See the rest of the quote. Also from Robin's post:

Relative to the Bayesians that academic economic theorists typically assume populate the world, real academics over-react or under-react to evidence, as needed to show respect for impressive academic displays. This helps assure the customers of academia that by affiliating with the most respected academics, they are affiliating with very impressive minds.

Comment author: taw 16 November 2009 03:54:42AM 0 points [-]

These look more like classical statistics vs Bayesian statistics than anything status-related.

I haven't seen any science run in Bayesian way, academic, commercial, or whatnot, and I have no idea how it would really look like, in spite of its theoretical appeal.

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